I lost my boat.

[Mulletguts]

Can anyone tell me how to get the Far harbor boat back as i have lost it to a bug on the Red Death Quest?

[wtiger27]

You should be able to fast travel to Far Harbor once you discover it.

[Zekiran]

Oh god that is a bug I've had before.

There are two significant bugs dealing with the Great Hunt quest. One is that you may sometimes be dropped into the water and be entirely unable to see (using VATS will let you target things). The other is that the boat becomes invisible.

https://fallout.fandom.com/wiki/The_Great_Hunt

From that page, the bug report and hopeful fix.

the player's boat may disappear, but the prompt to activate the boat's controls will still appear just off the northeastern coast of Red Death Island. The boat will be entirely invisible. Objects can still collide with the boat and it is not possible to fast travel after activating the controls to return to the docks of Far Harbor. Use your best pixel-hunting skills to activate the quest marker which will trigger the returning sequence. After a few seconds, the screen will fade to black and you'll find yourself on a boat returning to Far Harbor

[RabbitRidge]

Yeah, happened to me too (boat disappeared right from under me leaving me stranded in the water; I'm not using any mods). Fortunately I was wearing my hazmat suit and ended up swimming to complete the mission. The boat was there at either dock going forward after the mission in any case for me and acted normally in the rare case I actually use it.

Edit: Wasteland Survival Guide issue #7 sure came in handy then!

[random_frugality]

Well I've just had the unpleasant experience of having this bug show up in "The Great Hunt." But it wasn't that the boat disappeared, everything disappeared. It was the black screen mentioned in the wiki. I did eventually walk to the island, good thing I had the full Aquaboy perk. We killed the critter, which I never saw, and then I couldn't find a way back. A fast travel seems to have worked to get me back to Far Harbor, but I was still in a black screen, except for the compass and the cross hairs of the gun. I was able to use the map on the Pip-Boy to fast travel but after we got back to Far Harbor and the Mariner got laughed at and the quest ended, with a nice bit of XP, everything remained black. I can load previous saves, and I did that and tried the Great Hunt quest again but I had the same result. I have tried fast traveling to various places, but the screen stays black. I'm thinking that I have have to just go to an earlier save and forget about "The Great Hunt." Disappointing.

[Mulletguts]

The only way i got passed this was by at quest beginning DO NOT talk to her before you get on the boat. That eliminates the black screen. I still cannot find my boat. My pixel hunting skills are not that good it seems.

[Zekiran]

It really is a super annoying multi-faceted bug lol.

[random_frugality]

Originally posted by Mulletguts:

The only way i got passed this was by at quest beginning DO NOT talk to her before you get on the boat. That eliminates the black screen. I still cannot find my boat. My pixel hunting skills are not that good it seems.

Okay, thanks. I'll try that in a little while. After the quest ends is the boat back? Can you then still fast travel to and from the Commonwealth? I hope this works for me.

[Zekiran]

You don't need the boat to fast travel.

[random_frugality]

Originally posted by Zekiran:

You don't need the boat to fast travel.

Yes, after I killed the apparently small thing (I never saw it, of course) I fast traveled to Far Harbor, but at Far Harbor I still had the black screen with only the compass, cross hairs of the gun and access to the Pip-Boy. I even fast traveled to Sanctuary Hills but the screen stayed the same. I don't want to have to spend the rest of the game with a black screen. I wish I could find a fix for this bug. All I really want is for the rest of the game after "The Great Hunt" to not be in black screen.

[random_frugality]

Originally posted by Mulletguts:

The only way i got passed this was by at quest beginning DO NOT talk to her before you get on the boat. That eliminates the black screen. I still cannot find my boat. My pixel hunting skills are not that good it seems.

This time I tried just jumping onto the boat without talking to the Mariner. Same thing happened .

Interesting things is that I saved after we killed the red death critter and then I tried to fast travel. I fast traveled all right but the screen was still black. But when I went to reload the last save the game showed a scene, not total blackness. So some part of the game is seeing what's there, it's just not letting me know about it.

I wonder if I should start a new thread about this with a different subject header? I'm not really talking about a boat here, I'm talking about the game's display.

[Zekiran]

Your issue should be solved by one of the methods on the wiki link above.

[RabbitRidge]

Originally posted by random_frugality:

I did eventually walk to the island, good thing I had the full Aquaboy perk. We killed the critter

Sounds like wearing Power Armour and/or having a Companion might be contributing factors, since you used the past tense verb “walked” and pronoun “we” (unless strictly referring to the Mariner). I didn't have a companion in addition to wearing a hazmat suit enabling the ability to swim. Who knows…

[random_frugality]

Originally posted by Zekiran:

Your issue should be solved by one of the methods on the wiki link above.

And indeed it was! I had gone over the means shown on that wiki page for dealing with this bug quite a few times. This time I read the wiki page again and held down the VATS key again (the Q key on the PC) for a little bit. Suddenly the screen showed the island, or the murky water and air around it! I'd done this before but nothing had happened. I noticed this time that I did not have a companion with me. I do not recall if the companion had been with me in my previous attempts to get this small quest to become visible. The boat did become invisible when I was on the island and I could not find it again after a lot of looking around. So I did a save and fast traveled to Far Harbor. Oh yes, the Mariner just kept repeating how "It wasn't supposed to be like this." I did receive her gift. The scene at Far Harbor where she told the story and was mocked ran twice. Then she walked away and the game said that the quest had been completed. Just then I got notice that I had to defend Croup Manor. I got there, with my companion, and defended successfully. But I saw a BoS Osprey very nearby and went over. The Osprey got shot down, but the sound of it firing its gun kept going, which has not happened before, another bug or glitch. I finished off the rust devils the BoS had been shooting.

So there were a number of bugs during and after "The Great hunt." I'm hoping that my game hasn't become unstable. I'm also wondering if doing other things before I tackled The Great Hunt again made it possible for the fix to work this time.

Thanks to all who helped. I really had pretty much given up on this side quest and it was Zekiran's suggestion that got me to try yet again. I'm feeling better now.

[random_frugality]

Originally posted by RabbitRidge:

Originally posted by random_frugality:

I did eventually walk to the island, good thing I had the full Aquaboy perk. We killed the critter

Sounds like wearing Power Armour and/or having a Companion might be contributing factors, since you used the past tense verb “walked” and pronoun “we” (unless strictly referring to the Mariner). I didn't have a companion in addition to wearing a hazmat suit enabling the ability to swim. Who knows…

I wasn't wearing Power Armor. I am not sure now if a companion had been along on the previous attempts. I finally got it to work this time. I'm glad I can see the game again.

[Zekiran]

Having had that bug, actually both of those bugs on that page, yup. :) there's a reason I keep the fallout wiki on hand.